As if attempting to ape the building spree that characterises the urban growth of many megalopolis around the globe, the Brazilian artist Marlon de Azambuja concentrates on the bone structure that encompasses them all, from Tokyo to São Paulo. The focus on construction materials, flesh and bones of every building, is balanced by references to the figure of the architect, as it is called into question by essential geometric figures, triangles and circles, and by the light-coloured representations of three square rulers. The central installation in Max Estrella Gallery is composed by several structures made of bricks and metal clamps, reproducing the maquette-like vision of mega-cities’ skylines. These structures reveal the skeleton of most buildings that we inhabit in our everyday life, recurring to the raw material that compose them and stripping off their glossy cladding. The title of the exhibition, Brutalism, is mindful and sharp insofar as it mixes different sets of references. First of all the insatiable appetite for construction, which entails the voracious consumption of concrete, bricks, and stone. It is as well a matter of domination, in a masculine competition for towering over the highest of human-made buildings. In the end it is a commentary on economic terms of human industriousness, reduced to the essential phrasing of material and immaterial production. And yet, after all, the poignant conclusion seems to be an unavoidable acceptance of modern conditions of urban coexistence.